“The first fifty or so girls … just weren’t right”: Game of Thrones’ Fiercest Female Character Was a Pain in the A*s For Showrunners to Cast

SUMMARY

• Game of Thrones creators D.B. Weiss and David Benioff reportedly had to look through several actors before they zeroed in on Maisie Williams.
• Williams, who played Arya Stark, in Game of Thrones, reportedly beat out hundreds of young actors to secure the role.
• The actress once revealed that she had actually almost missed her GOT audition but was convinced by her mother.

Remember when the whole world tuned in to watch Game of Thrones no matter the time and discussed key plot elements and character deaths before they ruined it all with the final season? Those were some good times. Still, showrunners D.B. Weiss and David Benioff created a global phenomenon based on George R.R. Martin’s novel series.

One of the biggest reasons for Game of Thrones to work the way it did was its incredible casting. From Peter Dinklage to Lena Headey, the ensemble cast brought their A-game to the show and made it work so well. Weiss and Benioff mentioned that they had to search for hundreds of actresses before they zeroed in on Maisie Williams for Arya Stark.

Game of Thrones showrunners looked through several young actresses for the role of Arya Stark

A still from Game of Thrones | Credits: HBO

Finding younger talents is always a huge task for any TV show. Even if the child actors can bring in the emotional ability required to act, the logistics behind working with kids always pose a problem for a production. Still, Game of Thrones required plenty, and showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss reportedly had to sit through hundreds of auditions to find the right one.

The showrunners mentioned that they particularly struggled with finding the right Arya Stark. For starters, they aged her up to twelve years as opposed to her age in George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire novels. Arya is also one of the fiercest characters and almost an anti-heroine of sorts due to the journey she has within the series.

Maisie Williams in Game of Thrones | Credits: HBO

David and Dan, as the showrunners are called, reportedly sat through multiple actress auditions and pictures, but could not find the right one for a long time. They were reportedly location scouting in Morocco when their casting director sent them audition videos. They told Vanity Fair,

The first fifty or so girls we saw just weren’t right. We’ve got an incredible casting director in London, Nina Gold, and she was bringing in all these girls, and no one was right, and it was getting kind of late in the day and we hadn’t found anyone remotely close…there were forty thumbnail pictures of these girls, and we saw this one, literally that big on the laptop screen, and I was just like, ‘There’s something interesting about that face’, and clicked on it, and she was amazing.

The actress they found was Maisie Williams, who was reportedly just twelve when she began work on Game of Thrones. Williams became one of the breakout stars from the series along with actors like Emilia Clarke, Kit Harrington, and Peter Dinklage. She was even nominated for a Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress.

Maisie Williams almost missed her first audition for a school trip to a farm

Arya Stark in Game of Thrones | Credits: HBO

For nine years, Maisie Williams played the role of Arya Stark, the youngest but fierce daughter of Ned and Catelyn Stark in Game of Thrones. Arya’s journey in the series is a difficult one as she is taken from Winterfell to King’s Landing and is then displaced after her father is killed. She transforms herself into a fierce assassin to avenge her family.

However, Williams would have lost all of the fame and fortune had she given in to one impulse before her audition and her mother had allowed her to do so. The actress, who was reportedly only twelve, said that she almost missed her audition because she wanted to keep her other plans, which included a trip to a pig farm from her school. 

The actress spoke about the most pivotal moment in her career on The Drew Barrymore Show,

I said to my mom, ‘Do you think we can just miss this one and go to the pig farm instead?’ Thank god she said, ‘Let’s not. Let’s go to the audition’…I missed out on the pigs and it’s really, really affected me in my core ever since.

Williams would have lost out on one of the most popular characters in the film and went from being a supporting character among the ensemble cast to one of the protagonists.

Game of Thrones is available to stream on Max.

Written by Nishanth A

Articles Published: 1697

Nishanth A is a Media, English and Psychology graduate from Bangalore. He is an avid DC fanboy and loves the films of Christopher Nolan. He has published over 1,000 articles on FandomWire. When he's not fixating on the entire filmography of a director, he tries to write and direct films.